A Heartfelt Painful Return
by DemonHuntress
Summary: Clarice returns back to the Academy after a long struggle to get there. One shot. And pretend Gen-X hasn't ended yet.


A Heartfelt Painful Return

By: DemonHuntress

Disclaimer: They aren't mine. Go figure.

Rating: PG

Summary: A Gen-X ficcie. Blink comes home. Yippee!

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The past year and a half had been hell. When she had dimensionally displaced not only herself but the entire ship and crew of Phalanx they had all survived the jump and taken her captive. For over a year she was in their custody, forced under hideous experiments as they tormented their sole human prisoner, their own private faery, the nickname they liked to torture her with. But then one day something miraculous had happened. The slightest of an opening was all she had ever needed and when they gave it to her she took it with open arms. One misplaced second and she was gone.

But it hurt. By everything she held holy it hurt. Forced to take the trip in small jumps she was more grateful than she could ever have imagined possible that this was the last. She didn't think she could manage another one but now she was here. The sedatives and drugs the Phalanx had given her had made it almost impossible for her to make it and yet she had. Her body burned, she thought her brain was going to explode from the pressure and her legs were about to give out from under her but still she stood, bracing herself against the gate. Shakily she put one foot in front of the other as she made her way to the door. The sidewalk couldn't have been more than thirty feet but it stretched out into eternity. Her pace was slow and steady and halfway there she collapsed.

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He ran through the building, swinging from banister to light fixture as he made his way to the front door. He had been told that there was an intruder on the grounds and as he was the only one present in the mansion it had been up to him to take care of it. So ready for a fight he bounded across the front hall and swung the door wide open, preparing to take on whoever had encroached upon the school grounds. He was not prepared to see someone making their way carefully up the sidewalk and then topple midway there. He was even less prepared for who that someone was.

If you had asked him eighteen months ago he would have told you coldly that she was dead, thank you very much for bringing that painful memory up again. Hell, ten minutes ago he would have told you he same thing. But now? Now he wasn't so sure. She had changed of course, a year and a half of being MIA presumed killed in battle would do that to a person, but he still recognized her. There was no way he couldn't. She had saved his life, his friends' lives, and wasn't something he could easily forget.

She wasn't much taller, not much at all. Sprawled out on the ground it was really hard to tell, but she still seemed as short as he remembered. Much thinner though, very much thinner, with a starved, almost hollow look to her face. Her cheeks were sunken in, her bones more prominent, and the faery-like qualities she held even more obvious. The lavender skin that was her trademark had gone pale, even the maroon markings on her face were lighter. Her hair had grown tremendously from the short cut she had had when he met her, now reaching down past her shoulders, but it no longer shone like it used to. It had dulled to a lusterless, lifeless pink. Even her outfit was changed, instead of the black uniform he had met in her she now wore a light green tunic torn in several places. But she was still the same girl he had known.

He ran as fast as he could, racing down the concrete in record time. She had barely hit the ground by the time he was at her side lifting her back up. Slinging one of her arms around his shoulders he supported her weight against his own. She stumbled along beside him, all the time mumbling about how she could walk on her own if he would just give her the chance, she wasn't a baby. Frustrated with the slow speed at which they were going he finally just swung her up into his arms and carried her like a child into the school and to the first room he came to.

Carefully he set her down in a chair and stood back to let her catch her breath. He then pulled another chair over and sat beside her, waiting for her to speak. She simply closed her eyes and leaned her head back, grateful for the chance to rest. Then, with a small smile, she looked him straight in the eye, her solid green meeting his ice blue. "I'm back," she told him in a whisper.

"For how long, chica?"

She shrugged. "For as long as you guys will take me."

He grinned broadly. "Then may I be the first to welcome you to the Massachusetts Academy and Generation X." Her whole face lit up and she smiled, her eyes dancing and exhaustion taking a backseat to excitement. He couldn't help but smile with her. "We all missed you," he told her.

She nodded. "I missed you guys too, Ange." She slowly stood, holding out her arms to him and the two old friends embraced.

"Welcome back, Clarice, welcome back."

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see! blink doesn't have to be dead! i think i'm going to start a new club. BID. Blink Isn't Dead. anyone interested in joining (joking, joking, there's no club like that) i am grateful for AOA cause they bring her back and do some serious expanding on her character. but for now, review. i'm open to improvement suggestions! 

B.I.D IS UP AND RUNNING! Check out http://www.geocities.com/demonhuntressffn to find out more!


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